Battle of Mount Ortigara

Part of the Italian Front of the First World War

Mount Ortigara summit

Date	10–25 June 1917
Location	Southern Trentino, present-day Italy
Result	Austro-Hungarian victory

Belligerents

Kingdom of Italy

Austria-Hungary

Commanders and leaders

Luigi Cadorna

Ettore Mambretti

Arz von Straussenburg

von Scheuchenstuel

Units involved

6th Army

11th Army

Strength

300,000
1,600 guns

100,000
500 guns

Casualties and losses

23,000 dead or wounded

9,000 dead or wounded

The Battle of Mount Ortigara was fought from 10 to 25 June 1917 between the Italian and Austro-Hungarian armies for possession of Mount Ortigara, in the Asiago Plateau.

The Italians decided to launch an offensive because the Strafexpedition of the previous year had improved the Austrian defensive positions, whence the Italian armies of Cadore, Carnia and the Isonzo could be threatened.

The battle was prepared with considerable means (300,000 men with 1,600 artillery guns) concentrated on a short segment of the front just a few kilometers long. However, although the Italians enjoyed a 3-to-1 numeric superiority in both men and guns, as they faced 100,000 Austro-Hungarians with 500 guns, the attack still presented several problems:

The attack began on 10 June and after fierce and bloody fightings the Italian 52nd Alpine Division managed to capture the top of Mount Ortigara.

The Austro-Hungarian command promptly sent many trained reinforcements. On 25 June, the 11 Italian battalions guarding the summit were attacked by Austrian shock troops which retook it, the strenuous Italian resistance notwithstanding.

The 52nd Division alone suffered about half the Italian casualties. General Ettore Mambretti, commander of the Sixth Army, was considered responsible for the heavy casualties and removed from command.

A letter from a young soldier, written on the eve of the battle, is part of the museum of the Asiago War Memorial. Adolfo Ferrero wrote this letter to his family shortly before dying in combat, and the letter was later discovered in the personal effects of his page, whose body was exhumed from Mount Ortigara in the 1950s.

Alpini before the Battle

Heavy Italian artillery at work

Italian officers at an observation post on Cima Levante

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Wikipedia